Inspired by the archive of Richmond native Louis Draper, VMFA has organized an unprecedented exhibition that chronicles the first twenty years of the Kamoinge Workshop, a group of African American photographers he helped to found in 1963. More than 180 photographs by fifteen of the early members—Anthony Barboza, Adger Cowans, Danny Dawson, Roy DeCarava, Louis Draper, Al Fennar, Ray Francis, Herman Howard, Jimmie Mannas Jr., Herb Randall, Herb Robinson, Beuford Smith, Ming Smith, Shawn Walker, and Calvin Wilson—reveal the vision and commitment of this remarkable group of artists.

When the collective began in New York City, they selected the name Kamoinge, which means “a group of people acting and working together” in Gikuyu, the language of the Kikuyu people of Kenya. They met weekly, exhibited and published together, and pushed each other to expand the boundaries of photography as an art form during a critical era of Black self-determination in the 1960s and 1970s.

The group organized several shows in their own gallery space, in addition to exhibitions at the Studio Museum in Harlem and the International Center for Photography. They were also the driving force behind The Black Photographers Annual, a publication founded by Kamoinge member Beuford Smith, which featured the work of a wide variety of Black photographers at a time when mainstream publications offered them few opportunities.

In the continuing spirit of Kamoinge, Shawn Walker, Beuford Smith, Herb Robinson, and Tony Barboza have also made significant archival contributions and are among the nine members who recorded oral histories to provide the fullest account of the group’s first two decades. In addition, through a generous grant from the National Endowment of the Humanities, VMFA has digitized the Draper archive—which will be available online.

Working Together: Louis Draper and the Kamoinge Workshop
is organized by the Virginia Museum of Fine Arts.

Sponsored By

Altria Group
Fabergé Ball Endowment
Elisabeth Shelton Gottwald Fund

Community Foundation for a greater Richmond
Michael Schewel and Priscilla Burbank

Wayne and Nancy Chasen Family Fund of the Community Foundation for a greater Richmond

Drs. Ronald A. and Betty Neal Crutcher
Philip and Kay Davidson

Generous support for this project was provided by Bank of America Art Conservation Project
and the National Endowment for the Humanities.

Marketing support for Evans Court exhibitions is provided by the Charles G. Thalhimer Fund.